Bottles of wine, covered with dew, and otters

[cleolinda]

I've been sitting on this for a couple of days, but I can sit no more: If there is purpler prose than this, I don't want to know about it. Includes fanart and a dramatic reading.

ETA: In defense of Silk and Steel. In other words, an intentional burst of badfic?

Comments

[larabeaton.livejournal.com]

That goes beyond purple, into the ultraviolet spectrum.

[aldehyde.livejournal.com]

THIS.

[amberdulen.livejournal.com]

The thing is, I can see what the author was going for: some kind of luscious, Song-of-Solomon type effusiveness. But it just keeps going. By the time he got to the hair I was already going, "BUT WHAT WAS IT? PICK ONE!"

[scornedsaint.livejournal.com]

That's just...wow.

Also, he spent a lot of time making that spine-snake connection. Like, way too much time.

[soulforophelia.livejournal.com]

Yes! I saw that last night and was kind of disgusted/amused/shocked all at once. To think that the publishing group is a devision of Penguin Group kills me. And I am not published? What the hell! The world is cruel. (I also know plenty of other writers who can't get anything published and they are fabulous!) It hurts to read it.

[chulacabra.livejournal.com]

THIS. I've been getting nowhere in publishing my novel, and then I see this and weep for humanity.

[morganwolf.livejournal.com]

That rivals Amanda McKittrick Ros (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amanda_McKittrick_Ros) in delicious awfulness.

[particle-person.livejournal.com]

And Isabelle Vandervelde

[emerybored.livejournal.com]

I KNOW! My favorite line was "...her toes were snails, snails with shells of tears." WTH? And the fanart is fantastic. I love that he says that he couldn't cram all of the descriptions in.

[clodia-risa.livejournal.com]

Ugh. I'm pretending that that was a fake. Otherwise that's a minute of my life that I won't get back, and we can't have that now, can we? That sounds like something Penny*Arcade would write as a parody.

[reynardo.livejournal.com]

It's been doing the rounds. And alas, I only have two eyes to tear out in extreme and utter agony.

[aldehyde.livejournal.com]

haha i just saw this link on 3 other flisters yesterday. seems like the purple prose is spreading like fire ;)

[robinmc.livejournal.com]

Am I the only one who thought that read like a rather dirty Mad-Libs?

[particle-person.livejournal.com]

Which is going some, because all Mad-Libs are dirty, to my knowledge. At least that's how we did it growing up.

[karintheswede]

I die.

No, seriously. I perish. It hurts my eyes and my brain to read that.

[tenaya-owlcat.livejournal.com]

Oh my God... I so needed that laugh. Except that now my coworkers are looking at me VERY strangely. XD

Thank you!!! I reposted it to spread the purple!

[divadeanna.livejournal.com]

LOL Wow. Halfway through page 96, I somehow forgot what we were talking about. I think it happened when he compared her hair to the color of a leopard's tongue. ?????????

[julietvalcouer.livejournal.com]

If anyone wants to know what color that is, and assuming he means an Amur leopard and not say, a snow leopard, I can go out ask Kavan to quit pacing for a minute and stick out his tongue. Never thought one perk of zoo work would be the ability to fact-check purple prose, but there you are.

[katharhino.livejournal.com]

"Her face had the fragrance of a gibbous moon."

WHAT.

Oh dear lord. That should be an icon.

[apocalypsos.livejournal.com]

There aren't many quotes from those pages that shouldn't be icons.

[aoibhe.livejournal.com]

And otters.

[documentn.livejournal.com]

[picture of Inquisitors] Nobody expects...The Spanish Inquisition

[pause]

[picture of otters] And otters.

(Sorry, had to.)

[kittenkatt.livejournal.com]

Teeth bracelet! TEETH BRACELET!!

You shouldn't let Edward Dollen see this.

[goonie-freak.livejournal.com]

Her hair was the color of a leopard's tongue???

WHAT?!?!?!? I couldn't even read past that bit! I was laughing to hard.

Okay, I'm going back in...

OMG! "They were antique armor and tears of dragons." I...can't...go...on!

[nekostef.livejournal.com]

Oh my GOD. That prose has made it all the way to octarine.

[gwynnywonk.livejournal.com]

OMG THIS.

[chulacabra.livejournal.com]

SMeyer should put a link to this on her website since it makes Twilight seem like Ulysses in comparison.

[cindyg.livejournal.com]

THIS.

[elbales]

O_o

MY EYES

WTF indeed!

[teslaroo.livejournal.com]

At least now I can say I have read a sentence that contained the words "throbbed", "oboe", and "blindfolded circus high diver".

My day is complete.

A voice crying out in the wilderness

[laughingacademy.livejournal.com]

FWIW, here's a defense (http://amanuensis1.livejournal.com/216180.html) of the author by amanuensis1:

Ron Miller writes clever plot, rich prose with a good deal of self-mocking tongue-in-cheek, and there are two sex scenes in the middle book that he deliberately writes in an over-the-top, overly purple, substance-altered haze of text. If you take these scenes out of context, they have the potential to sound ridiculous. (emphasis mine)

I’m not familiar with the writer’s other work so I can’t vouch for this claim, but I thought some people might be relieved by the possibility that it’s deliberate badfic.

Re: A voice crying out in the wilderness

[chulacabra.livejournal.com]

So the scene is supposed to be a joke? But the guy who wrote the original LJ post read the entire book and missed the point. So it's either badly done Sci Fi or badly done parody, but either way it still sucks.

[rizny.livejournal.com]

...This just made my day.

*dies, just DIES laughing*

[cmdr-zoom.livejournal.com]

OMG your icon.
(former s_d member)

[7tree-hugger.livejournal.com]

I got to "her thighs were geese, pythons, schooners" and all I could think of was Wash and "some people juggle geese."

Not these geese my son.

[sun-star-n-moon.livejournal.com]

awww, I like your icon. =D

[cosette-esk.livejournal.com]

Spikenard. SPIKENARD. SPIKENARD?!

[katharhino.livejournal.com]

I know. *giggle*